The 479 BC Potidaea tsunami is the oldest record of a paleotsunami in human history. The tsunami is believed to have been triggered by a Ms 7.0 earthquake in the north Aegean Sea. The associated tsunami may have saved the colony of Potidaea from an invasion by Persians from the Achaemenid Empire. Tectonic setting The Aegean Sea is a seismically active region with complex plate tectonics interaction both within and surrounding the Aegean Sea Plate. Seismicity in the Aegean Sea is due to active extension within the lithospheric plate. The Aegean Sea Plate is defined along several major plate boundaries including the North Anatolian Fault which runs through northern Turkey, where the Anatolian Plate slides past the Eurasian Plate along this right-lateral strike-slip fault. The southern margin is dominated by active convergence of the African Plate. It converges north towards the Aegean Sea Plate at a rate of 5–10 mm/yr. The subduction rate along the Hellenic subduction zone at 35 mm/yr, however, greatly exceeds the velocity of the African Plate. North–south extension...

The 479 BC Potidaea tsunami is the oldest record of a paleotsunami in human history. The tsunami is believed to have been triggered by a Ms 7.0 earthquake in the north Aegean Sea. The associated tsunami may have saved the colony of Potidaea from an invasion by Persians from the Achaemenid Empire. Tectonic setting The Aegean Sea is a seismically active region with complex plate tectonics interaction both within and surrounding the Aegean Sea Plate. Seismicity in the Aegean Sea is due to active extension within the lithospheric plate. The Aegean Sea Plate is defined along several major plate boundaries including the North Anatolian Fault which runs through northern Turkey, where the Anatolian Plate slides past the Eurasian Plate along this right-lateral strike-slip fault. The southern margin is dominated by active convergence of the African Plate. It converges north towards the Aegean Sea Plate at a rate of 5–10 mm/yr. The subduction rate along the Hellenic subduction zone at 35 mm/yr, however, greatly exceeds the velocity of the African Plate. North–south extension...

The Sponsored Reserves are a category of reserve forces in the British Armed Forces, created by the Reserve Forces Act 1996. It allows for certain support or specialist tasks to be carried out by trained professionals, who also maintain a civilian career. The Royal Fleet Auxiliary, for example, are sponsored reserves subject to the Armed Forces Act. The first sponsored reserve unit was the Mobile Meteorological Unit, providing mainly aviation weather services to the RAF and the Army Air Corps. Other Sponsored Reserve Units have been developed in line with the 1998 Strategic Defence Review. See also Volunteer Reserves Regular ReserveReferences

Numerical weather prediction (NWP) uses mathematical models of the atmosphere and oceans to predict the weather based on current weather conditions. Though first attempted in the 1920s, it was not until the advent of computer simulation in the 1950s that numerical weather predictions produced realistic results. A number of global and regional forecast models are run in different countries worldwide, using current weather observations relayed from radiosondes, weather satellites and other observing systems as inputs. Mathematical models based on the same physical principles can be used to generate either short-term weather forecasts or longer-term climate predictions; the latter are widely applied for understanding and projecting climate change. The improvements made to regional models have allowed for significant improvements in tropical cyclone track and air quality forecasts; however, atmospheric models perform poorly at handling processes that occur in a relatively constricted area, such as wildfires. Manipulating the vast datasets and performing the complex calculations necessary to modern numerical weather prediction requires some of the most powerful...